Police and Corrections

Impact Injury Research

It goes without saying that police and corrections officers work in hazardous environments with significant potential for injury. Whether the threat be ballistic, stab, blunt trauma or even related to vehicle crash safety, Biokinetics and Associates Ltd. is available to help understand the risks. Our engineers and scientists have studied injury causation and prevention and we are equipped with dedicated laboratory facilities to support this work.

We can't protect our officers without first understanding the threats, and in a biomechanics sense that means quantifying the threat energy and relating that to a human's tolerance to injury. Only then can we develop better protection products and injury prevention strategies. If you need to better understand the injury threat to your officers, please give us a call.

Extendable Baton Testing

Extendable batons are a standard part of police kit, but it is vital that they perform as expected in the line of duty. The RCMP procurement specification for extendable batons includes a series of tests to ensure that the baton locks properly and remains locked under a battery of lateral strikes. Batons are locked in place using a pneumatic linear ram to accurately and repeatably simulate an officer's downward arm thrust. Following this are a series of lateral strikes to the baton to ensure that the unit remains locked in position. Biokinetics laboratory is available to test your batons as part of a tender offer or simply to compare the true performance of the products available.

Riot Helmet Testing

As the name suggests, riot helmets are worn in the extreme hostile environment of crowd control. An officer may be exposed to any thrown object imaginable as well as sticks, punches, kicks, caustic liquids and flaming Molotov cocktails. In the corrections environment there may include all of the above with the addition of bodily fluids and blunt threats during hostile prisoner cell extractions.

Biokinetics has participated in the Canadian Standards Association committee for Riot Helmets and Face Shields, and recently developed a revised draft specification for the National Institute of Justice riot helmet standard (2008).

Riot Suit Testing

Riot suits are worn by police officers in crowd control situations as well as by corrections officers in events of prison unrest or cell extractions. Officers are exposed to punches, kicks, thrown projectiles and other forms of blunt impact assault. These hostile duties require specialized protective equipment for all body regions.

The Canadian Standards Association Z617-06 Personal Protective Equipment for Blunt Trauma addresses these needs in a series of impact tests designed to evaluate the protection afforded by a garment to each body region. Impact tests target the chest, abdomen, groin, arms, elbows, legs and knees in both hot and cold conditions. Biokinetics is the only laboratory in North America currently equipped to perform all the tests described in CSA Z617.

Stab Testing

Many are surprised that bullet resistant garments offer only minimal protection against stab threats. In the corrections environment in particular, stab threats are more prevalent than ballistic threats and protective garments must be specifically tested against them. Biokinetics not only produces the laboratory equipment to perform stab testing, but we also offer stab testing to the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) 0115.00 standard. We can also run modified tests for unique situations as defined by the client.